Yellow - Grade 4 - Concert Band - Printed Version

Program Notes for Yellow

I was asked by a friend, Daniel Hodge, to write a piece of music for his high school band in the spring of 2008. The year before this, I student taught under Hodge and another amazing director, Julius Stevens, at Berryville High School, in Berryville Arkansas. One morning my car wouldn’t start. I called Hodge and let him know that if he wanted me to come in, I would need a ride. While I was waiting to get picked up (he couldn’t leave to get me until his planning period) I started writing a piece of music with the Berryville Band in mind. I eventually finished it and premiered it in “The Auditorium” in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, (In 1929, A composer by the name of John Philip Sousa gave “The Aud” its inaugural performance. Ever heard of him?) and coincidentaly, Yellow made its premiere in “The Aud” as well. Anyway, after the success of “Dichotomy: A Love Severed, The Ballad of Lazerhands”, (or what I consider to be a success. Ask me about that ol’ Lazerhands sometime!) Hodge asked me to write something else for him the following year.

I don’t remember exactly how it was that I settled on the idea of a suite built around the three primary colors, but I am grateful that I settled upon it. It gave me a wealth of material to work from. (and before I even finished Yellow, I was already brainstorming ideas for further suites based on the color wheel, “Secondary Colors” and “Neutral Colors” and “Earth tones”, just to name a few. Get all your friends to perform Primary Colors, and maybe it will happen!)

When I finally got started, I let my mind wander to try to get inspiration from the color yellow. What did yellow make me think of? What did it make me feel?

The sun. Summer. Having fun in Murphy Park. Watching the band march by in the annual Fourth of July Parade. The yellow tetherball pole at my elementary school. A school bus.

Once my mind got going, it wouldn’t stop, much like the kinetic energy that ended up filling the piece. I was listening to a lot of Steve Reich and Philip Glass when I wrote Yellow. The constantly evolving, but ever consistent drive of their music was intoxicating, and I found it making its way into Yellow. My love of Charles Ives’s music found its way into the closing segment with the “recess” like section that never settles down for even a second. And just to keep things interesting, and keep you smiling, quotes from different familiar tunes, and playground songs flow freely in the cacophonous conclusion.

I had a lot of fun writing Yellow, like I was back out playing kickball, or slamming pogs at recess. And it still makes me laugh when I hear it, almost a decade after finishing the first draft.

-Drew Morris
September 20, 2017